At last, it feels like spring. The weather has suddenly turned mild and sunny. We have reached the spring equinox.
The daffodils are blooming. The hedges are alive with singing birds. I’ve heard, and seen, my first song thrush of the season. We can breathe of sigh of relief after a week of anxious soul searching.
As a nation, we’ve been debating the issue of “assisted dying”. Despite the opinion polls showing strong support for the idea of allowing terminally ill patients to take a fatal dose of medicine, MSPs at Holyrood voted 69-57 against the particular bill before them.
It came at 10 o’clock on Tuesday night after many hours of emotionally charged debate. Commentators have been saying it was The Scottish Parliament at its best, with MSPs giving highly personal speeches and allowed to vote free from party discipline. It rounded off a whole series of debates over the 300 amendments tabled to the original bill.
Clearly, MSPs were struggling with the issue. At the start of the process they voted 70-56 in favour of the principle of assisted dying. But as they peered into the details of the bill, they began to have second thoughts. Among the complications were the safeguards against a misuse of the process – patients being put under pressure, from relatives or themselves, to end their lives. Then there were issues about medical staff being allowed to consciously object to taking part. There were concerns about the licensing of the medicines involved. These last two require UK Government approval.
Outside the parliament, there were small demonstrations for and against the bill. Those on one side arguing that people suffering from an incurable condition and with only an estimated six months to live, should be given the choice of an early death. And those on the other side, stressing the sanctity of human life.
It’s a debate going on around the world, with countries like the Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain, New Zealand and Canada leading the way with assisted dying laws already in place. Parliaments in The Isle Man and Jersey have voted for it. In June 2025 MPs at Westminster voted 314-291 in favour a bill for England and Wales but it has been held up in the House of Lords ever since. I wonder when the bill eventually returns to the House of Commons for a final vote, whether MPs like our MSPs will have second thoughts.
Personally, I am in favour of assisted dying. I think it is cruel to deny people suffering at the end of their lives the chance of a peaceful death. The quality of life is more important than its length. I’m sure assisted death happens anyway, out of sheer humanity, and it is better that it is regulated and respected. As to talk of elderly people being made to feel “a burden” to their families or society. The fact is that we over-70s are. I think it’s a useful way of measuring your life, trying to reduce your burden on family and friends, the community and the planet.
The one big benefit that has come out of the whole debate is a renewed commitment to improving end-of-life care. Palliative care is seen as the alternative to assisted dying. Afterall, assisted dying was only going to help an estimated 25 people out of the 60,000 who die every year. The Marie Curie hospice charity has pointed out that of the £1.3bn spent on healthcare for people in the last year of life in Scotland, £1.1bn of it is spent on hospital care. The hospice sector, it says, has been neglected, yet demand for it will grow hugely as the population ages. The government’s budget this year includes only £9.4m for hospices, a laughable sum compared with what’s needed.
The wolf in the room which the politicians are afraid to mention is that the care service is woefully under-funded. In my view we should revisit Andy Burnham’s scheme to charge a 10 per cent levy on all assets held by people at pensionable age to pay for a National Care Service. Everyone, as they grow older, would then be assured of a place in a nursing home or help in their own home if they should need it.
Growing old is not easy but there are ways of making it easier. And as each spring equinox come along, I wonder what’s going to happen to me. Will I be able to walk up the road near my house, and hear the birds singing in the hedges there? Not for long, it would seem, because this week one of the hedges, the one by fire station, was sawn down. It was an act of institutional vandalism conducted by someone who did not read the road-sign.
Growing old means growing grumpy. Let me take another look at those daffodils and cheer myself up.
